Appreciating the Windows Server 2016 Desktop Experience

We’ve talked a lot about Nano Server in this blog, but we know many customers will still appreciate the full desktop experience on Windows Server. Here’s what you get when you install that option and why you would want to use it.

When you install Windows Server with the full desktop experience, you are getting the same great Windows 10 UI experience with the added ability to install server roles and features. Features like Streaming Media Services, Windows Server Update Server, and RDS workloads run best on the full desktop experience.

In recent Windows Server 2016 Technical Previews, you may have noticed that the Windows Server with Desktop Experience installation option included a few additional Windows Client only features such as Microsoft Edge, Windows Store Client, and the Modern Calculator.

These features were temporarily included to gather additional feedback on their potential uses on Windows Server before shipping our RTM release. In the Windows Server 2016 RTM, they are replaced with the following:

If you are using…Now use…

Windows Store Client >>> Windows Store for Business

Microsoft Edge >>> Internet Explorer 11

Modern Calculator App >>> Classic Calculator

We expect most folks will not be affected by this change. However, if you have built any automation, processes, etc. that leverage these excluded features, we recommended that you review your usage of them and make any necessary changes to leverage the features that replaced them in the RTM release.